


It's Always Darkest Before the Dawn

by orphan_account



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, I'll update tags as I go along, Mentions of Major Character Death, Minor Character Death, Multi, Red Dawn kind of thing, Romance, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-28
Updated: 2016-10-12
Packaged: 2018-07-27 08:29:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7610932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The year is 2023 and a powerful enemy has invaded Clarke's home, can she find it in herself to successfully defend her home or will she just become another casualty of war?</p><p>The plot's inspired heavily by Red Dawn but it's gonna include a lot of themes from the 100 series, and of course Bellarke.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Pasta Sauce

**Author's Note:**

> The year is 2023, a fierce war rages between all of the world's powers, one side being the United Powers of Eastern Asia, or UPEA, for short. This side consisted of the eastern halves of both China and Russia and North Korea. The other side was the joint forces of Western Russia and China, backed by the UN, although no UN countries actually saw any combat, they would only send supplies and weapons. 
> 
> But surely WW3 would be over before it had begun wouldn't it? Wouldn't the countries have just nuked the shit out of each other before a shot had even been fired? Wrong. In 2018, just one year before the UPEA was formed all the world's powers agreed on nuclear disarmament and to have all research into nuclear weapons destroyed, that meant WW3 was to be fought with soldiers and guns, rather than big fucking weapons of mass destruction. 
> 
> Anyway, the war kicked off in 2019 when various political groups succeeded in having referendums passed in China and Russia to split both countries in two, once both countries were split they unified themselves by invading Mongolia and thus creating the massive country that is now known as the UPEA. North Korea then joined the UPEA with the promise that they would invade South Korea. Although the countries of the world, to their dishonour, ignored the invasion of Mongolia they decided intervention had to take place after the successful invasion of South Korea and the failed invasion of mainland Japan, and so the UN backed Russia and China to go to war with the UPEA. The main bulk of the fighting took place on the borders of Western Russia and China with both sides attempting to push the other back, but by 2023 this had resulted in a stalemate. Although the UPEA forces were significantly larger than Russia and China's they were not nearly as well armed, due to Russian and Chinese soldiers being armed by the rest of the world, including the USA, who were at this point had developed the most advanced weapons in the world. So the UPEA now wanted to get to the route of the problem...

Clarke Griffin sat at home, her eyes glued to the television as she watched live reports from the war over in Asia, videos of intense firefights and pictures of grotesque scenes of slaughter filled the TV. Although she was disgusted by the violence she was being shown she couldn't take her eyes away from it. She was snapped out of her trance-like state by shouts from her mother and father from the kitchen. 

"Oh so I guess me and your mom are gonna have to eat all this spaghetti and meatballs by ourselves, huh?" Her father, taunted Clarke from the kitchen, knowing he'd cooked her favourite meal and she would never miss spaghetti and meatballs. 

Quick as a flash Clarke snapped out of her trance-like state and was sat at the dining table ready to eat, Abby smiled at her as she laid her homemade garlic bread on the table next to Jake's spaghetti and meatballs, Clarke glared at the food as if she was making sure it stayed right where it was. Once both her parents had joined her at the table she wasted no time in filling her plate with food and tucking straight in to dinner. 

"I wish you were this excited about the rest of mine and your mom's cooking, Clarke." Jake chuckled as he watched Clarke shovel spaghetti into her mouth.  
Clarke glared at Jake, pasta sauce all around her mouth. "Well maybe you shouldn't make such nice spaghetti." 

"And my garlic bread!" Abby said as this as if she was pretending to be offended, even she'd admit that her husband made the best spaghetti she'd ever tasted. 

"Yeah, can't forget the garlic bread." Clarke smiled at Abby and wiped her mouth with a napkin. 

Jake then got up to open a bottle of red wine for him and Abby, he poured her a drink and then himself, he swirled his glass around in that way parents do when they're pretending they know about wine. "Enough about my awesome pasta, how was everyone's day?" 

"Just the usual really down at the hospital, nothing too exciting today." Abby smiled warmly at her husband and sipped her wine carefully. 

"Yeah school sucked, but I've only got a few more weeks until summer and then I can finally go to college to do something I'm actually interested in." Clarke seemed enthusiastic as she spoke, the certain something she was interested in was art, which was Clarke's real passion. 

However, Abby wasn't half as enthusiastic as Clarke was about college, of course Abby was proud that her daughter was going to college but the thought of her leaving the house tore her up inside, she just smiled weakly at Clarke and looked nervously at Jake, who on the other hand was looking proudly at his daughter. It was always his dream for Clarke to go to college and although he'd miss her while she was gone, Jake still knew the day Clarke set off on her new adventure would be the proudest day of his life. 

"How about you, dad? How was your day at work?" Clarke asked her father. 

"Yeah not a bad day at the workshop, I actually-" Jake was cut off by a loud explosion followed by all the lights going off in the house. The whole family looked around nervously as Jake got and got a flashlight out a drawer. 

"What was that?" Clarke stood up from her seat and moved over to her father who was making his way outside to check what was up. 

"I don't know, sweetie, it'll be nothing, don't you worry." But Jake Griffin was wrong, very, very wrong. 

As he looked outside the sky was alight with a large fire raging in the distance, a result of the explosion, probably an issue with a power generator or something, Jake assumed. But one look to the sky proved him wrong, the night sky was filled with planes dropping what looked like soldiers out of the sky. 

"Clarke, Abby, get inside right now."


	2. Friendly Faces

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clarke runs into some familiar faces.

"Dad, what's going on?" Clarke was clearly panicked as she spoke to her father, Jake ignored her and went upstairs with the flashlight, a few moments later he came back down carrying a handgun and a backpack. 

"We've been invaded." Jake's expression was stern and serious, not his usual kind hearted face that he wore every day, he handed the backpack to Clarke and looked out the window out onto the street. "Shit." He muttered to himself as he turned to his wife and daughter, trying his best not to look panicked by everything that was going on. 

Jake approached Clarke, looking apprehensive, he hugged her tightly and held her face in his hands as he spoke to her. "Clarke, you and your mother are going to listen  
carefully to me alright?" He almost choked up on his own words, a tear fell from his cheek onto the floor. "You are going to have to run out through the back door and head towards the forest and you don't stop running until you reach the caves we used to go to, remember?" 

Clarke broke away from her father as her vision began to blur with tears. "What are you talking about, I'm not leaving you." 

Abby put her hand on Clarke's shoulder, her face was wet from crying but she did her best to look strong for her daughter, she looked lovingly at her husband as she understood what he was about to do. "Clarke, we need to go." 

The three of them embraced together and held each other tightly, it was Jake who finally let go and looked at the two most important people in his life. "I love you both, so much." He handed the gun he brought from upstairs to Clarke and walked towards the front door. "Now go." 

Abby and Clarke dashed out of the house and over the wall of their back garden which led straight into the forest, the two of them hadn't been running for more than a minute before they heard two shots ring out loudly. 

"No." Clarke stopped running and began to cry loudly, she tried to turn back towards the house but was stopped by her mom, Clarke fought as hard as she could but there was no way Abby was letting her go back towards certain death. 

Before they knew it soldiers with flashlights were close behind them and their time for grieving was interrupted. The two of them continued to run as fast as they could through the forest and towards the caves. 

"Fuck." In an almost cliché fashion Abby had tripped over the root of a tree and was lying on the ground struggling to get up. 

"Come on, mom." Clarke did her best to help her mom up but it was no use, there was no way she could carry her to safety without the soldiers catching up. 

"You carry on without me, I'll be fine, I promise." Abby smiled reassuringly at her daughter, who at this point was an absolute mess, faced with the death of her father and the almost certain death of her mother, Clarke was an absolute whirlwind of emotion. 

But Clarke was smart, and she knew that they'd both be dead if Clarke didn't take off, so she ran, even quicker than before, leaving her mom behind to be found by the soldiers but this time was different, no shots rang out. Silence. 

Finally, Clarke had arrived at the caves, she breathed in a sigh of relief as she realised the soldiers had given up the chase but immediately sat down and began to cry as everything flooded back to her. She cried because she left her father to die. She cried because she left her mother to be captured. She cried because she was scared. 

A twig snapped behind Clarke and she spun around pointing her gun in the direction of the noise, at the other end of the gun were two boys of similar age to her stood in the dark. As they stepped closer slowly she began to recognise the two of them. 

"Guess this ain't a good time to smoke a bowl, eh Monty?" Said the taller of the two boys. 

"Yeah." The other boy paused for a second and spoke quietly to his friend. "Jasper, maybe we should get out of here, she's got a fucking gun." 

"Good point." 

"Wait, Jasper? Monty?" Clarke stood up and lowered the gun "It's me, Clarke, Clarke Griffin." She quickly wiped away her tears and moved towards the two of them, the look of panic on Clarke's face turned into that of relief, and Jasper and Monty sure looked a lot happier now that they didn’t have a gun in their faces. 

"Oh shit, Clarke, what you doing out here, buddy? Me and Monty were gonna smoke a lil weed and look at the stars and shit out in the woods." 

Clarke looked between the two of them in bewilderment, shocked at the fact that they had no idea what was going on. "Wait, so you two haven't seen the soldiers yet? Heard the gunfire? Or noticed that all the town's power went off after a large explosion?" Jasper and Monty just looked at each other and shrugged. 

"Exactly how high are you two?" 

"Pretty high." Monty chuckled a little but stopped when what Clarke was saying sunk in. "So, we've been invaded and me and Jasper had no idea?" 

Silence for a second before Jasper slumped to the ground with his head in his hands. Monty sat next to him and tried his best to reassure him but he was just as distraught, sobering news indeed. 

"I gotta go back into town." Jasper stood up but was blocked by Clarke. 

"There is no way you can do that, we need to stay out here and wait for the army to come in and sort this mess out." 

"But my family.." 

"Jasper, listen to me, they spared my mom, so they'll do the same to your family just as long as they don't get in their way." 

Clarke put her hand on Jasper's chest and did her best to calm him down, Monty was still sat down on the ground when he piped up. "What about your dad?" 

"He got in their way." She said bluntly. 

"Well what now then?" Jasper said with his arms in the air. 

"I guess now we try and sleep in the caves, I've got the gun so I'll take first watch." Clarke looked down at the gun in her hands, unsure if she knew how to even use it, let alone if she could actually take a life with it. 

"Sounds like a plan, come on Jasper." The two of them disappeared into the cave and Clarke followed them in, she stayed close to the entrance to the cave but still close to the two boys, a good spot to keep watch on everything.  
\--- 

By the time morning had come around it was Jasper's turn on watch, the two others were woken to the sound of shouting. 

"What the fuck is going on here?" Clarke came out of the cave to see Jasper pointing the gun she had given him at a boy and a girl, the boy aimed a hunting rifle at Jasper and the girl aimed a 44. Magnum. 

"These two stumbled across our camp and pulled their weapons on me, now we've got ourselves in a little situation." Jasper kept his eyes on the two intruders and kept the gun aimed at the boy, he looked a little older than the rest of them but the girl was around the same age, the big difference with them was that while Jasper's hands shook behind the gun they were calm and looked ready to fire. 

"We were about to lower our weapons before this idiot started waving his handgun around." The girl spoke sharply and bitterly towards Jasper. Jasper shrugged a little as if what she was saying was true. 

"Well, maybe we should all put our guns down, huh? Jasper you hand me the gun." Clarke slowly approached Jasper and he handed her the handgun back, but he didn't lower his gaze from the boy or girl, they followed suit and lowered their weapons. 

The two strangers walked slowly towards Clarke and Jasper, their eyes fixated on the young boy, as if they were hungry lions and he was innocent gazelle, they looked a little disappointed that they didn't get to shoot anyone. 

Jasper was about to say something before he saw Monty come out of the cave looking tired and confused. "Oh well look what you've done now, you fucking woke Monty you sick bastards." Jasper scowled and looked at the disgruntled Monty who was still very much confused. 

"Enough of the petty arguing, clearly we would be stronger together, we're all the same boat here guys." Clarke looked desperately between the two groups, she held her hand out to the boy and smiled at him. "I'll start to ease the tension, my names Clarke Griffin." 

The boy finally spoke up and even cracked a small smile, although you’d blink and you'd miss it. "I'm Bellamy Blake, and this is my sister, Octavia."


	3. Schemes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A plan begins to take place.

Clarke looked around at her four new 'friends', two of whom were dorky stoners that Clarke knew a little from school and the other two seemed pretty close to killing them about an hour ago. But despite the fact that she was banded together with a group of complete misfits, Clarke couldn't help but feel safe around them, even the two gun toting siblings seemed to make Clarke feel at ease, they seemed to know their way around a weapon and that was something that would come in handy. As for Monty and Jasper, they were just really good company, their dorky jokes and humour made Clarke forget that she was stuck in the middle of a warzone. 

"So, when are we making our first move?" The group had been sitting in silence for a while but Bellamy finally piped up, his voice was gruff and deep and when he spoke everyone listened to him. 

"You mean, you want us to make a move against them? With their tanks and bombs and massive fucking machine guns, whilst we have two handguns and an old hunting rifle. Bellamy, you're fucking insane." Jasper looked round towards Clarke and Monty for support against Bellamy's proposed suicide mission. 

"They took everything from me, I will have my revenge and if I have to kill every one of those bastards to find the one that killed Lincoln then I will, and I'll do that on my own if I have to." Octavia looked at Jasper coldly, her animosity wasn't placed towards him but towards those who had taken Lincoln from her.  
Jasper looked towards the ground, he wasn't so good in situations like these. 

"Maybe the Blake's are right, now I'm not saying we start an all out war on these fuckers but we need to fight back. Ok, I know these people aren't killing everyone they see, they're taking prisoners, that means we have an army right at our fingertips, all we need to do is free this army and take back our homes." Clarke's voice trembled as she spoke but she was confident in what she was saying, despite how deathly afraid she was she knew she had to do what she can to help her town and of course her mom. 

"Of course the Blake's are right." Octavia said it is as if was a matter of fact, she looked over to Jasper and Monty and grinned wickedly to them "So, are you in or out?"  
Monty and Jasper exchanged a nervous glance but looked towards Octavia and nodded in unison. 

"How about a scouting mission? See what we're up against." Monty shrugged a little, he was unsure himself about his suggestion and really just wanted to contribute but the whole camp was on board with the idea. "Me and Jasper might not be able to fight too well or shoot but there is one thing we're good at." 

Jasper smirked at Monty and finished his sentence as he realised what Monty was about to saying. "Getting into places we shouldn't be." 

"You two are going to sneak back into town and run surveillance?" Clarke was gobsmacked at what the two boys were saying, honestly, she didn't think they'd last two minutes in there but she couldn't think of a better idea for the groups first move so she went with it. 

"We'll leave at night under the cover of darkness, if we aren't back by the morning then that means we're dead or captured, either way don't wait around for us." Clarke knew Monty from school as this sweet and kind, loveable dork, same goes for Jasper, but seeing Monty speak so sternly and seriously frightened her, even though  
Monty's voice shook as he spoke and his hands shook more he looked determined to do his job. 

"We won't let you down guys." Jasper smiled weakly.  
\---

Jasper and Monty had been gone for most of the night now and the sun was beginning to rise, panic and fear began to set into Clarke as she thought of the worst. She couldn't lose more people she was close to, not so soon. 

Octavia was keeping watch outside of the cave so it was Bellamy that noticed how uncomfortable Clarke looked, he took a seat next to her and smiled half heartedly, he immediately knew what was bothering her. 

"Your friends will be fine, they might be total dorks but they're smart." Bellamy put his hand on Clarke's thigh as if that was going to help reassure her, she shivered at his touch and smiled awkwardly. 

"I guess so, I don't even know them that well but I still care about them, a lot." Clarke paused for a second and debated whether she wanted to spill everything to some boy she barely knew, of course she did. "They've already killed me dad and they've taken my mom, I can't even bare to think about how they're treating them, I guess I'm just not ready to lose anyone else." Clarke looked Bellamy in the eyes, he looked sad and sympathetic, a side of Bellamy that she was seeing for the first time in their short time together. 

"Oh, I didn't know about your mom and dad. We'll get your mom back and I'll be damned if we don't avenge your dad. Me and O lost our parents at a young age and from then on we've been doing things on our own so we didn't really have anyone to lose when we were attacked, except O." Bellamy lowered his voice and looked out of the cave to check his sister wasn't near. "They just burst into our apartment while her boyfriend, Lincoln was round, we were already packed and ready to go so all we had to do so all we had to do was take care of these soldiers, there was only two." Bellamy shook his head and choked up on his words. 

"He was so close to making it out, we thought we took care of the soldiers, but one of them, with his dying breath managed to squeeze the trigger one last time and got Lincoln in the back of the head as we left. He was dead before he even hit the floor." Bellamy's voice was filled with anger and resentment, as if he blamed only himself for Lincoln's death, his face was twisted with anger as he spoke, he almost spat out his words as he recounted the story. 

"Blood must have blood." Bellamy muttered. 

After everything Clarke had been through and hearing the story of Lincoln's death Clarke found herself actually agreeing with what Bellamy said, Clarke wasn't a violent person but the idea of avenging her family was suddenly becoming appealing to her. 

"Nice to see you two getting close." Said a familiar voice from the mouth of the cave. It was none other than Jasper Jordan stood with Monty and Octavia, Jasper beamed a large smile, clearly the mission was a success. 

Bellamy quickly took his hand off Clarke's leg as he realised it had been on there the whole time, Clarke ran up to Jasper and Monty to hug them tightly "You guys sure took your time didn't you?" She spoke like a concerned mother to the boys. 

"All the worrying will be worth it for the intel we gathered." Monty smirked, clearly very pleased with himself. 

The five of them sat down together in the cave, huddled around Monty and Jasper as they prepared to divulge the information they had gathered.  
Monty was first to speak. "I'm sure this isn't a surprise to any of you but firstly we can confirm that the invasion has indeed come from the UPEA, and there is a lot of them over here. They are all very well armed and they have some pretty heavy machinery with them, tanks and everything." 

Jasper was up next. "But, they have no immediate air support, so if they want any back up from the skies it's going to take a while to get here, which is good because if they could call in attack choppers whenever they wanted I'm pretty sure this whole underground insurgency would be over before it started." 

"Lastly, they've turned downtown into a sort of ghetto. Like the Nazi's used to do, that's where they're keeping all remaining survivors, we didn't manage to get in but from what we saw, it isn't very homely at all." Monty looked at Clarke, knowing her mom would more than likely be stuck in there, but Clarke wasn't the only person with someone stuck in that ghetto, she knew Monty and Jasper, hell, even Bellamy and Octavia wanted to liberate that place just as much as her. 

"Oh and their base thingy is in our school. Even more of a reason to hate that place." Jasper added. 

"Good work guys." Bellamy nodded at Jasper and Monty, who in return just sort of giggled childishly, they clearly looked up to Bellamy and his acknowledgment of their achievement meant a lot to the two of them. "Guess our next order of business will be arming ourselves up, we're gonna need to get back in to town." 

"Easy enough, we found a route into town that's virtually unguarded." Monty looked towards Jasper who nodded in agreement. 

"Good, good. Once we're back in town we'll be able to pick off soldiers by drawing them into close quarters, hope you guys are good with knives." Bellamy spoke about his plan which included all of them killing for the first time as if it was no big deal, Clarke, on the other hand threw up in her mouth. 

"At nightfall we do this." Octavia said coldly.


	4. Action

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clarke and the gang put their plan into action

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I totally messed this chapter up and forgot to post it when it should have been posted, resulting in a large chunk being missing from my work, hopefully now with this being up it'll make a little more sense.

The group are on the edge of town, the area where Monty and Jasper had said the guards rarely came when Bellamy pulls two knives out of his rucksack and hands them to Monty and Jasper. The two boys just stare blankly at their new weapons. 

"Slash...don't stab." Octavia tells the two of them, Monty looks to Octavia in disbelief, he knew for a fact that he didn't have it in him to slash anyone and Jasper still has his eyes on his knife, watching it to make sure it didn't accidentally kill any of his friends while he wasn't looking, because that would be a totally Jasper kind of thing to happen. 

Clarke already had her own knife that her dad had packed in the bag he gave her right before she left. She twirls the knife around in her hands, looking at it intensely, it was a large Bowie knife with her father's initials inscribed into it, looks like Jake Griffin might get some revenge after all. 

Bellamy and Octavia have their own knives, of course and so they draw them right before they set off into town, the tension between the group is electrifying, even the Blake siblings are uncertain of whether they'll make it back alive, but one thing is clear and that is that each and every one of them was ready to do whatever it takes to make sure this mission was a success. 

Jasper and Monty lead the way into town, the group is silent, even in their movement they can't be heard. Clarke mulls over in her head about what she's going to do when she's faced with the possibility of having to end another human's life, she pushes it to the back of her thoughts, the mission was the priority, not Clarke's inability to kill. 

The group travel through back alleys in town and quiet spots, often narrowly avoiding patrol groups, Clarke's heart would pound within her chest after a near miss like this. Finally Jasper and Monty stop in an alleyway next to a fire escape that led into the ground floor of an apartment building. This is where they were going to lure their unsuspecting victims. 

They wait behind a garbage container. And wait. And wait. Finally three guards pass by the alleyway, oblivious to the hidden teens. Bellamy signals with his hands that the mission was a go and the rest of them take their places within the apartment complex. 

Bellamy whistles in the alleyway, alerting the soldiers to the noise, just as planned they move to investigate the noise, meanwhile Bellamy makes his way into the apartment complex, knowing he'd be followed in. 

The soldiers enter cautiously, with their weapons aimed high and prepared to shoot on site. Clarke stands behind the door to one of the apartments, looking through the viewer in the door, she knows her cue to engage, once the last soldier passes the door.   
Seconds seem to become hours as Clarke's pulse hits the roof, she steadies herself and grips the knife tightly as she watches the first soldier pass her door, then the second and then the third. 

A beat. 

And all hell breaks loose, she swings the door open quickly and grabs the soldier from behind plunging her knife deep into his neck before he even has a chance to register what is happening, Octavia emerges from the door opposite and stabs the soldier from the front. The struggle lasts only a few seconds before Clarke let's go and the soldiers lifeless body slumps to the ground, she looks up to see how her comrades were doing. 

Jasper was sat down against the wall next to his victims body, the dorky stoner kid who wouldn't harm a fly had just taken his first life, he was covered in blood but he gripped his knife still as if his life depended on it, even if his hands shook and he was visibly crying. 

Monty was in no better state, he was leaning against the wall throwing up, he came from behind the soldier like Clarke had done so he hadn't covered himself in blood, he didn't look the soldier in the eye whilst he took his life away like Octavia and Jasper had to do but the killing still bore heavy on Monty, clearly. 

As for Bellamy he had already looted his victim of their weapons and was beginning to do the same to the other two soldiers, Octavia, who had been just as enthusiastic as her brother to kill some UPEA men, was just staring blankly at her and Clarke's shared victim. 

Bellamy hands Jasper, Monty and Clarke the rifles he took from the soldiers whilst he puts the handguns and knives in his own bag. "Still not enough weapons." He shakes his head and looks around at the group. Three assault rifles, one hunting rifle and five handguns wasn't going to be enough to wage a guerrilla war on an invading nation. 

"It'll have to do for now." Clarke looks around nervously, the longer they were in town the more likely they were to have their cover blown and Clarke knew for a fact that they would pay with their lives for what they did tonight. 

Finally, Jasper picks himself up off the floor, gripping his new weapon tightly, his eyes are red and puffy from crying and he's snivelling but he was certainly doing his best to put on a brave face. "Clarke's right, we need to get back to camp, we can arrange another mission there." 

And so they quickly hide the bodies in the apartment rooms and make their quiet escape, the whole way back to the caves is silent, it's even tenser than it was before. 

Clarke shivers as she thinks through what she did not long before, she remembers every detail. How the man gasped in shock when she grabbed him from behind. How he struggled against her for a second before he began to breath wildly after she stabbed him in the neck. How his body went limp and slack after Octavia finished him off. 

Monty breaks the silence when the weary warriors get back to camp. "Oh, I also picked these up." He holds up three radios in both hands. "I thought we could use them to listen in on the enemy or something." Usually Monty would be smiling profusely but he looks beaten up and exhausted, I guess killing really does take it out of you. 

"Monty, you're a genius." Bellamy takes one of the radios and examines it. "We can use this to plan our next attack." 

"Haven't we had enough of plans and attacks for one day?" Clarke sighs, there's a tinge of anger in her voice, she couldn't believe that after what everyone had just been threw Bellamy actually wanted to be talking about more violence. 

"Well I'm sorry princess but this is the world we live in now, we fight to survive and if you don't like it you may as hand yourself in to the enemy right now." Bellamy bites back, his voice is husky and just as tired as Clarke's but it wasn't the fact that he'd just killed for the first time that he was drained, it was the fact that the mission didn't wasn't as fruitful as he hoped it to be and there was still so much work that needed to be done before his ragtag group of misfits was ready to take on the enemy. 

Bellamy seems as if he's about to go on more of a rant but Octavia interrupts him. "Bellamy, she's right, let's just rest for a bit." Octavia speaks slowly and quietly, not her usual self that is so often full of energy and zest for life. 

Bellamy looks at his sister, with blood smearing her face and a tired look upon her, seeing his sister like this shocks Bellamy to his very core, the girl he swore to protect, his responsibility was now a killer, her innocence was now long gone and only now was Bellamy seeing this. 

He then looks at Jasper, covered head to toe in blood, he hasn't spoken in a long time and he seems to be shivering, his gaze fixed on the floor, only now was Bellamy seeing the damage the attack had done to his group, they needed the time rest and recuperate. 

"Maybe Clarke is right." Bellamy mutters as he stands up and walks away from the group and into the cave. 

Clarke gets up to follow him but is blocked by Octavia. "He needs his time alone, he'll calm down, trust me." She smiles weakly and Clarke stifles a smile back.


	5. Blowbacks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a hectic first week on the run the gang decide to relax with the help of a few 'herbs'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this one took so long to do, I got a little distracted.

Clarke and her friends had been on the run for a week now and within that week their camp had begun to take decent shape, the large forest gave them access to fresh water, plenty of animals to hunt and berries to pick when the time was right. They'd only made one trip back into town since they killed those soldiers and that was to return to the old apartments to gather supplies, food, clothing and bedding from the apartments were life savers and made their time out in the forest that bit more comfortable. 

Clarke wakes up to the sound of Monty and Jasper talking merrily outside, she brushes sleep from her eyes and walks out from the cave and into the light. Her watch says it's just gone half eight in the morning. 

"Clarke, we've got some..." Jasper pauses for a second, unsure of what adjective to use to describe what he's about to say. He settles on no adjectives. "News." 

"Go on." 

"Well, me and Monty used to have this dealer right? And he was all kinds of fucked up, like this dude was batshit crazy." Jasper speaks enthusiastically, a welcome change from the usually dull and grim atmosphere around camp. 

"But his weed was bomb." Monty interjects. 

"Yeah that was some good shit, real big bags too like it was real good value for mon-" 

"Guys!" Clarke chuckles. "You were saying?" 

"Oh, yeah, anyway, he was a total nut job, a wacko, whatever. So he had this like small shed hidden out in these woods that he used as like a hideout if things ever turned nasty and he had to go on the run. He was real paranoid. But one time, right, he took us to his shed because he was all out of weed and he had some left there, so I'm betting if we go to the shed now we'll find a fuck load of weed." At this point Jasper had already stood up and was walking around telling his story and giving his presentation on why the group should go find these weed. 

"You want us to go on a hunt for some pot?" Bellamy was leaning against the entrance to the cave, looking at Jasper and Monty with a puzzled look on his face. "You stoners are out of your damn minds." 

"I bet he had a ton of weapons too, that guy was always strapped, man." Monty interjects, again. He was good at interjecting in sentences, he could really drive a point home for you. 

"Yeah, Nigel was fucking nuts man, bet he has loads of cool guns." 

"Sounds like a plan, come on Cheech, let's not waste any time" Octavia slings a rucksack of supplies over her shoulder and chambers a round in her rifle. "You too, Chong, I'm gonna need both of you stoner weirdos to help me out." She winks at Monty as she goes past him, he picks up the hunting rifle whilst Jasper carries a handgun with him, they lead the way. 

Clarke chuckles to herself as she watches the three of them disappear deep into the forest, even if they did only return with a bit of weed she'd still be happy to have some sort of moral boost round camp. Ever since they killed those soldiers the mood had been at an all time low, they hunted using makeshift spears and tried building their camp in the day and at night they did nothing but sleep and stand watch. Occasionally they'd make small talk and chit chat and of course Jasper and Monty would goof off, but things weren't the same, and they never will be. 

Bellamy notices how contemplative Clarke was looking as she mulls over how things had changed so drastically in such a short amount of time. "Something on your mind?" He asks as he sits down next to her on one of the camps makeshift chairs next to a table Bellamy had made that is covered in berries and other fruits picked from the forest. 

"We've changed, Bellamy. We used to be kids that never dreamed of this kind of life, killing and stealing from others just to survive, living like savages in the forest." Clarke looks worried and panicked when she speaks. 

"Who we are and who we need to be to survive are two very different things." Bellamy smiles half heartedly, unsure with his answer but at this moment in time, it was the best he could come up with. 

"Do we really deserve to survive if we're going to live as murderers?" Clarke's eyes are welling up now as she contemplates her existence as a killer. 

"We are not murderers. You are not a murderer. We kill because we have to, we have no choice in this. Clarke, out here it's kill or be killed, only the strong survive, and you are the strong. Over the time we've been here and spent together I've seen a strength in you that I never thought existed." Bellamy is sincere in what he's saying but Clarke has her doubts, she looks away from him and wipes her eyes. 

Bellamy moves closer to Clarke and holds the bottom of her chin, his eyes burn into the back of hers as he looks intently at her, she shakes at his touch and bites her lip but still keeps eye contact with him. Bellamy's head moves slightly towards Clarke but before the movement even registers with Clarke they're interrupted by the sound of gasping. 

"Who the fucks there?" Bellamy stands up from his seat and looks round surveying the area, he picks up a rifle and looks through the sights to find the source of the gasping. 

He finds Octavia, Monty and Jasper not so subtly hiding behind a tree, they come out from behind it knowing their cover is blown, each of them laughing as they walk towards Bellamy and Clarke. 

All three of them are carrying two large gym bags each that look completely full. "Glad to see you two are getting along" Octavia smirks at her brother. 

"Us? Nah I fucking hate him still." Clarke struggles to hide her grin and blushes all over, and she's convinced she does actually hate him but that doesn’t change the fact that she had the sudden urge to kiss him right then and there. 

Bellamy looks sheepishly at his sister and doesn’t even bother responding to Clarke's comment, for such a confident and charismatic young man he sure was shy right now. 

"Well, in other news, we have hit the jackpot." Monty beams to his friends and the three of them drop all the bags they're holding and start unzipping them. 

Two bags of guns and ammo, two bags of non-perishable food and two bags full to the brim with weed. Jasper, Monty and Octavia all grin widely, Jasper and Monty clearly more happy at the fact that they found so much weed, Octavia seems to be most happy at the new toys she now had. 

Bellamy walks over to the six bags on the flaw and struggles to even get a word out, he's in that much shock. "Guys, this changes everything.' He manages to say. The bag of weapons didn't just contain any old guns though, it had military grade assault rifles, LMG's, snipers, shotguns. It even had grenades and a crossbow thrown in there for good measure. 

"No more running from the UPEA, now we can take the fight to them." Bellamy's eyes light up as he picks up an M16 rifle and holds it tenderly, like a child. The others look at Bellamy uneasily, happy that they found all these new supplies yet uneasy at the thought of fighting the UPEA in open combat.   
… 

"There." Jasper sighs in relief. "Five joints of the finest marijuana rolled and ready to smoke." Jasper grins excitedly and looks around his friends to see their reactions to him rolling the last joint. 

The five of them are sat on the floor close to the mouth of their cave, it's night and a full moon and blanket of stars illuminates the sky. Each of them holds a joint in their hands, Jasper and Monty couldn't wait to get the rest of them high, being the stoner dorks they were they managed to convince the others to stoned within the day they found all the weed. 

Monty's face is a mirror of Jasper's, grinning from ear to ear and smiling giddily like a child on Christmas morning, Octavia seems pretty relaxed and was playing it cool, it was clear she'd smoked weed before but nowhere near as much as Monty or Jasper so it wasn't that big of a deal to her that she'd be getting stoned again. Clarke looks almost as uneasy now when she's holding her joint than she did when Bellamy was getting excited over his new weapons earlier, she clearly hadn't smoked weed before. 

As for Bellamy his face was fixed into a scowl, not too different from usual, he'd been mumbling earlier about how it was a stupid idea for them all to get stoned together during the middle of a war. 

"Everything's gonna be fine, we heard on the radio that no soldiers are aloud into the forest to conduct searches until further notice so they can keep guard of the town. That means we have all the time in the world to get stoned." Monty smiles reassuringly, mostly to Bellamy but also smiles warmly to Clarke. 

Clarke isn't worried about being found by soldiers, she's confident that they have the forest to themselves for the foreseeable future. Clarke is nervous about getting high for the first time, it's illegal for starters, it does crazy things to your body and the smell makes her feel sick. 

But the war on drugs can take a backseat during the UPEA occupation of America, Clarke calms herself and reasons that nothings illegal in a time like this, she killed a dude not long ago, one joint isn't going to make her a bad person, is it? 

Before Clarke even had time to debate the idea of getting high she's holding a lit joint, along with the four others. Her hands trembles as she brings it up to her mouth, Jasper and Monty look on, eagerly awaiting Clarke to take her first toke. Finally she does it, it's a small drag but she coughs as she inhales. 

Not that bad. 

Monty and Jasper chuckle as Clarke takes another drag, everyone else, even Bellamy starts smoking now. Of course, Monty and Jasper show off with their smoke tricks, blowing hoops and French inhaling. For a moment, the five of them seemed like normal teens, smoking weed out in the forest underneath a beautiful night sky.   
Clarke feels her eyes become heavy as she makes her way through the joint, her body begins to relax and she feels warm and happy. Bellamy unstiffens and visibly loosens up, he begins taking larger tokes and isn't so cautious when inhaling. 

Jasper, Monty and Octavia all smirk and carry on getting progressively more stoned. Clarke wonders at how Jasper and Monty can inhale so often without coughing up, but then again smoking must be second nature to them. She remembers all those times in High School when they'd stumble into class fifteen minutes late smelling of weed, with their eyes glazed over looking bloodshot. "It's our allergies!" They always used to say. 

Clarke wonders what it would have been like to hang around with Jasper and Monty before shit hit the fan, she never spoke to them that much before shit hit the fan but she always used to think about how much of a good time they used to have. Those two really know how to party, Clarke remembers one time when she was at a house party that those two were at and they hot boxed the poor girls bathroom. When they finally opened the door a huge veil of smoke escaped into the house, the fumes alone nearly got Clarke high. 

"You two should totally do blow-backs." Jasper grins cheekily, his eyelids hanging heavy over his eyes, he barely looks awake he's that stoned. They were all onto their second joints now, this was way more than what Clarke planned on smoking but she couldn’t stop, it was the first time in a long time that she was enjoying herself. 

To Clarke's surprise it's Bellamy who eagerly asks how to do blowbacks. 

"It's easy." Octavia takes a drag of her joint and leans in close to Jasper, he follows her lead and leans in to her as if he's going to kiss her but stops just as their lips are inches away from each other. She exhales smoke into his mouth whereupon he inhales the smoke and lets it out with a smile. 

"Easy as pie." Monty chuckles. 

Clarke shrugs at Bellamy who takes that as indication to go for it. He slowly takes a drag of his joint, holding the smoke in his mouth as he leans in towards Clarke, she follows his lead and leans in to him, closing her eyes and leaving her mouth agape. She feels the warm smoke enter her mouth but is caught off guard by Bellamy's lips touching hers, her eyes shoot open but she still allows her lips to linger on his a few seconds before they both pull away and Clarke inhales the smoke. 

The other three sit there with their jaws slack, unsure themselves at what just happened. 

"Did you two just kiss?" Octavia snickers like a child and Jasper and Monty can't help but chuckle alongside her, this situation wouldn't even be funny if it wasn't for the fact that everyone was super stoned. 

"No." Bellamy quickly jumps to his own defence. "Our lips just brushed, it was nothing." Almost as if the weed had worn off on Bellamy he's back to old, stern self, but after correcting his sister he slumps back down against a tree, still very stoned. 

Clarke still has no idea what to make of the situation, maybe he didn't kiss her on purpose but she definitely aloud herself to linger when she thought he was kissing her. She's fully aware that Bellamy is an attractive young man, but she never thought she'd have the urge to kiss him like she did just then, was it the weed? Possibly.   
Monty, Jasper and Octavia were now sat in a clearing in the trees, barely within eyesight but still close enough to hear them slightly, Clarke makes out that they were sat in the clearing looking up at the stars. Clarke smiles to herself at the thought of her three stoned friends sat there in wonder at the vastness of the great nights sky. 

"Finally some peace and quiet." Bellamy sits next to Clarke at sighs in content. 

"Yeah, tonight's been so fun but it's nice to get a little break from the kids." Clarke laughs and looks over to where the other three are. "It’s nice to see them happy, they've had it rough for too long." 

"Don't forget yourself." Bellamy nods to Clarke. "I'm glad you've enjoyed tonight, things have been so tough recently so I'm glad you've had a chance to chill out." Bellamy smiles sincerely, although he's still pretty stoned he means everything he's saying. 

"Yeah, I'm pretty fucking chilled, aren't I?" Clarke laughs, one of those laughs you only ever do when you're stoned and laugh at the absolute stupidest shit. "I can't believe 

I actually saw you crack a smile today AND laugh." She lightly digs Bellamy on the arm, who repays the favour with a soft nudge. 

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, not such a hardass am I?" Bellamy chuckles.   
Clarke laughs slightly "No, you're alright, actually." 

"Just alright?" 

"Just alright." 

Clarke thinks for a second about the blowbacks before with Bellamy, whether it's worth asking him if it really was a kiss or not. Finally, she plucks up the courage to ask Bellamy but realises he has already nestled his head on Clarke's shoulder and is fast asleep. She looks down at the boy and smiles to herself, this will do for now.

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry about the long ass note at the beginning, this chapter just serves to set up everything that is to come really.


End file.
